Rainy evening, no wind, practice canceled, time to write

[rfrance0718]

Back in March I did a Florida Cruise, which I worked in right before the High School Sailing Season kicked off March 31st. Since Tami couldn't go on the sailing trip, because she was recovering from shoulder surgery, I skipped a week of practice so that we could go to the keys so that she could get some needed sunshine. Since then it's been a busy time working on the Oday, running practices, and coaching at regattas. All good.

For the cruise, my brother Bill stood in for Tami. We also teamed up with 3 other friends doing a shake down cruise on a new-used Presto 30. My buddy Mark was taking possession of the boat at Pine Island. Scott and Dick were sailing at the Daysailer Midwinters and then joining us. Bill and I towed the Oday down without incident, and took our time setting up the boat, while Mark worked out the purchase details and took some short sails with the sellers. We ended up hanging out an extra day while some weather went through and then the two boats headed south on a perfect morning.

We hopped to Fort Myers, Marco Island, Everglades City, and down to the tip of the Everglades with the intention of going on to Keys, but I ran into an issue, having mostly to do with my own stupidity. Bill and I got a late start out of Everglades City and planned to catch up to the other boat at Cape Sable. We would be arriving after dark, but it was a calm, full moon night, and finding them at anchor would have been easy. However, that's when a battery issue, that I got a warning about, the night before, came to be. I noticed, that, like the night before, my battery was draining. While the night before, it had drained down to 11.9 by the morning, now it was already at 11.9 just after dark. An hour later, 5 miles short of the anchorage, it was at 11.7, and I knew that we had a real issue.

Since I was sure that our Nav lights wouldn't last and we were adjacent to an inlet, I decided to duck in and figure out the issue in the morning. That was a good move, because just after we dropped the hook, the battery went completely dead. At that point I figured that the battery was shot, and that we should sail back to Everglades City to buy a new one. That sail was a bit tricky because I didn't have my GPS and my phone was low on power as well. While it wasn't  hard to navigate along the shore, it was difficult to find the mouth of the river, and I was low enough on phone power that I wanted to use it as a last resort. Eventually we did spot the channel, which is very well marked up to Everglades City, and we got a dock at a very nice Marina.

After a quick inspection, which I could have performed that morning, I found the issue. My charge controller's buss, barely accepts the thick solar wire specified for my panel, and at some point I had messed up the one slot. The resulting poor connection was actually causing a reverse flow that was sucking the life out of the battery like a Lampre Eel. Once I created an improved connection the battery charged fully, and proved to be fine. IF I would have just totally disconnected the cables from the panel, the battery would have easily lasted a couple of days.

In the end, it wasn't an awful thing being at a very protected dock. The 20 mph gusts we enjoyed on the way back to Everglades city, became 30 to 40ish for the next 2 days. The marina had a tiki bar and a pool, and there were restaurants nearby, so we were good. We bided our time, spent beautiful night anchored by the river mouth, and sailed to Marco. We enjoyed a dock and another tiki bar there, and sailed to an anchorage off of Sanibel, and then enjoyed a great sail back to the north end of Pine Island.

In the meantime, our buddy boat had some issues of their own. Their motor was getting hard to start and it quit shifting into reverse. They had sailed, in the same 20 plus gusts that we saw, to Key West, but their lack of reverse kept them from getting into a marina. Now the 30-40ish gusts were hitting them and they had dragged anchor once. They couldn't row to shore in the wind,  and were stuck on the boat for the first day. On the second, they learned that there was a water taxi, and they did get into town, keeping a nervous eye on the boat. When they finally headed north their motor quit for good. They spent two nights out, nearly becalmed, but made their way back to Pine Island about the same time as we arrived.

In the end, the problems were dealt with, lessons were learned, and we all had a really fine time, and our tow back to Columbus was a breeze. Attached are some pics.

HS Sailing ends next Monday. I just did bottom paint on the Oday, and now I'm polishing and waxing the topsides. I have a few smaller things to do, and I'll tow the boat up to Lake Erie next Wednesday. I've got a new mainsail coming in a couple of weeks, and I've made some significant improvements on the boat's heavy weather ability. Looking forward to some longer, windier overnighters on the lake to prepare for adventures to come. (Bahamas, Nova Scotia, and ?. I wish that British Columbia wasn't so far away.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.You cannot view this attachment.

[Doug SC]

Sounds like a great trip! It's been steadily raining here, with brief let ups and a constant overcast sky for 3 days now. So, I too, have been posting. Thanks for taking the time to write. I really enjoyed your story. Successfully dealing with the situation you found yourself in holds a certain satisfaction even if it changed your plans. Murphy has many assistants, and I often seem to be one of them.

I wonder how the hurricanes have changed the area. I used to pollinate crops on Pine Island in my commercial beekeeping days. It was a good place to winter bees.

[Captain Kidd]

Good report! Thanks for writing.